


the demon summoner's handbook

by philomendron (tetrapteryx)



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Climbing Class, Demon Josh, Demon Summoner AU, M/M, Magic Realism, Necromancer Emily, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Wizard Chris
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-07
Updated: 2015-10-07
Packaged: 2018-04-25 06:04:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4949509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tetrapteryx/pseuds/philomendron
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris is a wizard who summons a demon to help him find his wayward mentor. Josh answers.</p><p>EXCERPT: Chris covered his face in his hands and groaned. This wasn’t how a summoning was supposed to go. The Stranger had taught him all about the wiles of demons, how they would take on a form meant to tantalize and could appeal to your darkest desires or offer limitless power, with sizable hidden fees. (Your soul, for a start.) Protection against puns was not in the handbook.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the demon summoner's handbook

Chris waits seven days for The Stranger to appear before pouring the summoning circle into place.

The homes of conventional summoners tend to look like something out of the Halloween-edition of an Anthropologie catalog, featuring dimly lit smoke-filled rooms full of bolts of cloth embroidered with buzzing occult symbols, books belted tight with chains and scurrying wisps of arcane will.

To form his circle, Chris had to remove the remains of a partially-constructed Lego Millennium Falcon and unplug the twisted nest of power cords that fed his router, computer and gaming consoles. There wasn’t anything in the cramped and disheveled room that spoke for his relative power in the magical arts, but instead authored alphabetized volumes for his unsuccessful efforts to resist buying special-edition action figures and trade copies of graphic novels, as well as a terminal inability to move his dirty clothes the three feet from the floor to the laundry basket.

With the salt circle in place and candles firmly attached to the floor in hardened puddles of wax, Chris spoke the words of power.

"Hello? ...Anyone there? I could use some help here."

Words of power are fueled by the belief of the speaker. Chris, who always had to rehearse his order at a restaurant (and experienced a 60:40 success rate in saying it coherently), spoke with the relative belief of someone hoping to get home on time while waiting in line at the DMV.

Only the rasp of his breathing filled the silence. Chris consulted his binder and the enclosed laminated photocopies of his mentor’s more legible scrawls. There was a possibility that he transferred the symbols wrong. He flipped rapidly between several pages wishing, not for the first time, that Google Translate supported Unmodified Ancient Sumerian.

He looked at the circle again to compare a rune, fumbled the binder with nerveless fingers and flinched when it hit the ground with a slap.

There was someone in his circle.

Well, a something that looked like a someone. Due to the overwhelming absence of a soul and an existence devoted to causing abject misery, demons were considered people in the same sense that members of Westboro Baptist Church were considered people. In short, not at all.

The something didn’t look at Chris or his ensuing apoplexy. They appeared masculine, with cropped hair and an artfully rumpled flannel shirt. Chris checked them over, disappointed (and kicking himself over being disappointed) when he couldn’t see any evidence of ash on their clothes or horns or cloven feet. Their arrival wasn’t even heralded by a burst of sulphur or tortured screams of the damned. 

If not for the fact that they made no attempt to move from the circle, and instead opted to study his room with a laser-like stare, Chris would have thought it wasn’t a demon at all. His brain clicked over what to say, discarding several options rapidly. The handbook didn’t explain what exactly a summoner did after successfully calling forth a demon, or specify acceptable levels of small talk before working around to the reason why they were ceremoniously yanked out of the nether realm. 

Right when he was about to lamely begin with “So, how’s the weather down there,” the demon’s eyes flicked over to his own. 

And stared, because demons didn’t need to blink and often forgot to. 

“Nice digs,” they offered simply. 

Chris became painfully aware of the pile of dirty clothes, teetering stack of used dishes on his desk and the fact that, despite his best efforts, none of his posters sat evenly on the wall. “Ah, you know,” he said, making a sweeping gesture at the room. “It has walls… a ceiling… and strong enough wards to keep the hypothetical shambling horde at bay.” He scooped up the binder and paged through it, pretending to look absorbed as he struggled to get himself under control, stopping at the drawing of the complex circle he inscribed on the floor. “And, if you don’t mind me saying, you don’t look anything like a Stolas or Orobas to me.” 

“They were busy. Places to go, people to torment, wizards to consult who _don’t_ use a stencil to make their summoning circle,” they gestured at the weighted-down tarp that the circle was set around. “Look at this. Did you use a ruler and an economy-sized compass?” 

“H-hey,” Chris spluttered. 

“You do know that the mathematical perfection of the circle does nothing for us, right? I mean, you could draw the biggest schlong the second circle of hell has ever seen, and they’re _all_ about engorged genitalia over there, but as long as one end of the salt line touches the other someone has to answer. They might be pissed about it and try to eat your face off---”

Chris burst. “I didn’t call you here to talk about _dicks_ \---” 

“But you did call me about someone, right? You have the look of someone who might invest in some otherworldly assistance to,” they paused and dramatically summoned a crackling flame to one hand. “ _Light their fire._ ”

Chris covered his face in his hands and groaned. This wasn’t how a summoning was supposed to go. The Stranger had taught him all about the wiles of demons, how they would take on a form meant to tantalize and could appeal to your darkest desires or offer limitless power, with sizable hidden fees. (Your soul, for a start.) Protection against puns was not in the manual. 

“I need you to find a person,” Chris spoke into his hands. “And I don’t need your help getting a date.” When he looked up the demon was frowning at him. 

“Isn’t that something you magic people are supposed to be able to do?” they asked. “A little blood, a little spit, a little---” Chris didn’t realize he would have liked to live a life where he never saw a demon make a jerking-off motion until it was too late. “And presto! No one can hide from you! Not that I want to complain, dude---”

“You’ve done nothing but complain since you got here,” Chris interjected.

“---but you summon the forces of evil and to do what, play bloodhound? Where’s the fun, the _spice_ ,” Their voice turned cloying, like sickly-sweet incense. Invisible tendrils of will tested the circle. “ _You need to get the girl, the boy? Both? I can do that. Or how about revenge? A nice guy like you, I bet people have taken advantage of that your whole life_ \---” 

Chris waved a hand in front of his face, as if to clear the air. “I don’t need any of that. I need to find The Stranger.”

The eerie quality left the room like opening a window. The demon looked briefly discomfited, but recovered. “Do I look like a librarian to you?” 

“Not the book--- that’s his name. Well, it’s not his name, but that’s what they call him. I don’t know his actual name. I don’t think anyone does,” Chris took a deep breath, and tried not to shrivel under the weight of their gaze. “My mentor has been missing for a week. Nobody knows where he is,” his voice began to pick up speed. “I can’t use blood magic to find him because the last time he tried to teach me how, I blew up the three hamsters he made me test it on. I had to scrub them out of the floor after. So I don’t think I’d like to try again with an actual person, if that’s alright with you.”

Some demons, the type that cloud the air with their oily haze of malevolence, might interrupt here with a gravelly laugh, a murderous glint in their eyes and a quip like: “Sounds like my idea of a good Friday night.” The demon in the circle thought very little of _those_ demons, their fondness for crisp three-piece suits and lounging in armchairs like rejected Bond villains, so said nothing. (This demon did think very highly of hamsters though, for those interested.) 

“I need to find this guy and make sure he’s not dead in some pit somewhere, because he’s the one who has to go before the Parliament of Magi and tell them that I don’t need to be apprenticed anymore,” Chris gestured around the room at the unplugged electronics, which were safely enclosed in their own salt circle and outnumbered anything else in the room. “I can’t go through another round of some quasi-Amish weirdo teaching me how not to go mad with power, when that power tends to short out most of my electronics. I’ll stick to magical obscurity if it means I can finally get through some of my Netflix queue.” 

Chris had fisted his hands through his hair at some point during the rant, pulling it into strange corkscrews. The demon studied him calculatingly for so long that Chris tried to remember what he said, convinced that he slipped up and the demon would soon be cashing in on his immortal soul. 

Instead they grinned suddenly, blindingly; as if it was a conversation between two friends, not a wizard and his summoned demon. 

“So what’s in it for me, sport?” The demon raised a hand, their smile unchanging as Chris instinctively flinched backward. Sparks flew as they ran a nail across the invisible barrier, drawing strange sigils. “You get your mentor and, eventually, out from under the thumb of those who would tell you how to live your life. What would you trade that for?”

His mind went blank. Most of Chris’ preparatory work had been spent on trying to summon the actual demon, which involved long days slogging through the disjoined notes of The Stranger and his frankly appalling drawings, as well as clearing his web cache after visiting questionable websites for assistance. Planning what he would barter for their unholy power didn’t even cross his mind.

“Let me give you a hand because you seem so confused,” the demon pressed both hands to the barrier now, ignoring the way the energy arced and filled the air around them, burning their skin as it landed. “If I were another kind of demon, I’d consider a fair trade to be one of your lovely eyes, seeing as they’re my favorite color and look so good on you. Or I could take your heart, if you’re eager to part with it quickly. But consider yourself lucky, bro, because I’m not like any of those pontificating assholes. Let me stay here while I track down this guy for you, because hell gets old very quickly and doesn’t get a good wifi signal.” 

Hell, in fact, operated on dial-up. If you ever mentally compared the sound of your grandparent’s modem to the unearthly shrieking of tormented souls, you’d be absolutely correct. Heaven, for all its promises of eternal peace and glory, had yet to upgrade to fiber. It was a serious point of contention amongst its denizens.  


“No way,” Chris scoffed. “How long until you run off and continue your hellish crusade up here?”

The demon smiled. “I’m bound to my oath just as you are. I’ll stay here, with you, until he’s found. Simple as that. If you’re feeling adventurous we can watch Netflix and heat up some Jiffy Pop.” 

Chris adjusted his glasses to avoid looking the demon in the eye. He had been thrown off ever since looking up and seeing the demon in the circle. He had expected the summonings for Stolas or Orobas, demons who had worked with The Stranger in the past and might have some incentive that he be found, to work. He hadn’t been expecting---- this. 

But what were the chances that anyone else would answer? The Parliament blew off his repeated questioning, citing the mysterious nature of wizards. They believed The Stranger would surface eventually, but that didn’t explain Chris’ growing feeling of foreboding, the one that started when he was the only one who arrived to their weekly meeting. 

“Rule one,” Chris counted on his fingers, ignoring the demon’s victorious fist pump. “You stay with me at all times. Rule two, you don’t take any souls or make any other deals while we work on finding The Stranger. Rule three, you don’t kill anyone, directly or indirectly…”

There are many ways to make a deal with a demon. The more traditional hellions prefer a note written in the petitioner's blood, sealed with a sparking sigil. Some of these notes were so long and complex, that they resulted in the near-exsanguination of the applicant. For others, a verbal agreement will suffice. 

For the demon in the circle, there was only one way to seal the deal. 

Pulse pounding in his ears, Chris swiped away a segment of the salt circle, feeling a rush of power as the barrier broke. 

The demon approached in the span of a blink, hands already fisted in Chris’ pullover. Cold lips moulded over his own, pressed hard enough to bruise and a swipe of tongue to ease the sting. 

“The name’s Josh,” the demon said, pressed close enough to watch the dilation of Chris’ pupils. “And I can already tell that this is going to be _great_.”

**Author's Note:**

> Edit: Finally made this a one-shot. This work will likely not be updated.


End file.
